1
deteckative can't set forth to work until he has a clue, that being a
rule of the game."

"What kind of a clue was you lookin' for?" asked Long Sam. "What's a
clue, anyway?"

"A clue," said P. Gubb, "is almost anything connected with the late
lamented, but generally something that nobody but a deteckative would
think had anything to do with anything whatsoever. Not infrequently
often it is a button."

"Well, I've got no button except them that is sewed onto me," said
Long Sam, "but if this here sack-needle will do any good--"

He brought from his pocket the point of a heavy sack-needle and laid
it in Philo Gubb's palm. Mr. Gubb looked at it carefully. In the eye
of the needle still remained a few inches of twine.

"I cut that off'n the burlap he was sewed up in," volunteered Long
Sam, "I thought I'd keep it as a sort of nice little souvenir. I'd
like it back again when you don't need it for a clue no more."

"Certainly sure," agreed Mr. Gubb, and he examined the needle
carefully.

There are two kinds of sack-needles in general use. In both, the point
of the needle is curved to facilitate pushing it into and out of a
closely filled sack; in both, the curved portion is somewhat flattened
so that the thumb and finger may secure a firm grasp to pull the
needle through; but in one style the eye is at the end of the shaft
while in the other it is near the point. This needle was like neither;
the eye was midway of the shaft; the needle was pointed at each end
and the curved portions were not flattened. Mr. Gubb noticed another
thing--the twine was not the ordinary loosely twisted hemp twine, but
a hard, smooth cotton cord, like carpet warp.

"Thank you," said Mr. Gubb, "and now I will go elsewhere to
investigate to a further extent, and it is not necessarily imperative
that everybody should accompany along with me if they don't want to."

But everybody did want to, it seemed. Long Sam and his audience joined
Mr. Gubb's gallery and, with a dozen or so newcomers, they followed
Mr. Gubb at a decent distance as he walked toward the plant of the
Brownson Packing Company, which stood on the riverbank some two blocks
away.

It was here Henry Smitz had worked. Six or eight buildings of various
sizes, the largest of which stood immediately on the river's edge,
together with the "yards" or pens, all enclosed by a high board fence,
constituted the plant of the packing company, and as Mr. Gubb appeared
at the gate the watc